


This Melody Calling You

by mochibun



Series: cause people have not been kind to me [3]
Category: Linked Universe - Fandom, The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Becoming a Horse Goddess, Cooking, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Linked Universe (Legend of Zelda), Marriage, Mothering Your Eight Children, Women Being Awesome, from a LW, i guess?, title from "epona's song", wherein malon has her own mask, with your Very Stupid but Lovable Husband
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-25
Updated: 2020-03-25
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:47:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23314876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mochibun/pseuds/mochibun
Summary: When they talk about the Hero of Time, sometimes they will talk about his masks.What they did not talk about was the one his wife possessed.(Malon has a mask of her own.)
Relationships: Malon (Legend of Zelda) & Malanya (Legend of Zelda), Malon (Legend of Zelda) & Time (Linked Universe), Malon (Legend of Zelda) & Wild (Linked Universe), Malon (Legend of Zelda)/Time (Linked Universe)
Series: cause people have not been kind to me [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1734361
Comments: 29
Kudos: 367





	This Melody Calling You

**Author's Note:**

> inspired by roane's prompt submission for the LU discord's weekly prompt challenge.

Her father always enjoyed talking about a peculiar story. He told it when she was about to sleep, tired from putting the horses away. He told it to guests when they came over to Lon Lon Ranch. He told it to anyone and everyone he could, but most all his daughter, which the story was about in the first place.

When Malon was born, there had been a strange man. He had a smile on his face and only introduced himself as the Happy Mask Salesman; he’d a great backpack that seemed simply  _ enormous. _ And, as his name had suggested, he had an abundance of masks.

_ But the story is not about the Happy Mask Salesman,  _ her father liked to say.  _ It is about my wonderful daughter,  _ and the salesman knew it too. When Malon had been born, and her mother was weak in the legs but strong hearted anyways and held her babe in her arms, the Happy Mask Salesman came knocking on the door.

“Hello,” he had said, “I have noticed that there is a special thing about this ranch, and I would like to see it.” (This was not how it went down. Her father liked to exaggerate; what had happened was her mother had talked to her aunt who had talked to her brother who thought he knew a doctor who could tell the future. He did not. It was just the Happy Mask Salesman.)

“Come in, come in,” Talon had said joyfully. So the Happy Mask Salesman came in, and he found what he was looking for. It was Malon, sitting in her mother’s arms—a mere babe, but she’d a fiery tuft of red hair that crowns her head.

“She is special,” the Happy Mask Salesman said. He would not elaborate, but every parent knew that a special child was something to be celebrated. And the Happy Mask Salesman stared at baby Malon, and she stared back with her big cow eyes. This much was true—there was no exaggeration here.

All things considered, though, he had left a very strange present for the baby—a horse mask, with red markings and white flaxen hair. “She can wear it,” he said, “it will not do her any harm. It is hers, anyway.”

“Harm?” her mother had asked. “What harm could possibly—“ and she cradled her child closer to her. A mother’s love, after all, was a very potent and magical thing.

“No harm will befall her,” he said, simply. “The goddess wills it so.”

“Praise Hylia,” Talon murmured, caught up in his father’s pride. He should have paid more attention instead.

But Malon grew up a happy child, all things considered, even when her mother passed. Her father, in his grief, hired another ranch hand named Ingo who was not all that bad. _(_ _Ev_ _ en if, _ Malon liked to think privately,  _ he was a bit of a lazy bag of bones.) _ She grew into her mother’s role, after her death; she tended to the cows and raised the horses.

There was a very sweet horse born, one year, which she had helped birth with her own hands. Her mother had died, and Malon felt a kinship—she named the horse Epona. She was a beautiful mare, and Malon quite liked her. (Strangely enough, the horse’s mane was the same flaxen white that the mask had, too.)

This is the part of the story you know: once upon a time, there was a boy who was destined to be a hero, even if he was really just a boy. His name was Link, and he thought horses were funny creatures (he liked the way they walked). And one day, there was a very persistent girl who asked him to take an egg to the castle.

They fell in love. Wasn’t that what you were supposed to do when a girl gave you an egg?

//

Once upon a time, after a very persistent girl had given Link an egg, he fell asleep and the world fell to ruins. And then he woke up. Seven years had passed, and much of the world was not as he knew it; Link followed his destiny and saved it.

A princess gave him a chance.  _ Will you relive your childhood? _

_ No, _ the boy first said. But the princess shook her head and hid her trembling hands in his; she had survived on hope for seven years and this boy did not even have that. How could he, when he did not learn it as a child?

_ For me? _ she said, and the boy wondered.

In one timeline, he says no. In one, he says yes. In one, this conversation does not occur, because neither of them are alive to have it.

Whatever the answer, a very persistent girl still had a horse mask.

//

In the timeline where he said  _ yes, _ and the princess sent him back, a very persistent girl still had a horse mask. She, like the rest of Hyrule, did not remember being older. She did not remember what  _ growing up _ felt like or what  _ falling in love _ felt like. Her limbs were still short and baby fat still clung to them, and the only person she’d ever loved beside her Pa was probably Epona.

But she gave a boy an egg, and he took it. He had always been a sweet boy; Malon sang a horse’s song and two came running (only one of them was a horse). One day, when she had not seen him after a while and she was singing Epona’s song, he came back. But he was different. Quieter. Malon still loved him all the same, and that became a constant as they grew up (just as a horse mask sat in her drawer). 

One day, the boy got down on one knee and said,  _ will you marry me? _ She said,  _ not with that ring I won’t. _ They got married anyway. Her father attended it, and he had grey streaks through his hair now. He walked her down the aisle. When they kissed, it felt like a childhood dream come true.

This was life as Malon knew it: a husband she woke up to every morning, who still slept because he was older and more tired and did not have the muscles for farm life like she did. She had a husband who had sun blond hair and was very silly, and could not cook for either of them no matter how hard he tried. She had Epona, who grew up to be a beautiful mare, and she had her father, who had laugh lines and wrinkles and still liked to tell that old story about Malon’s birth. Or would have, if he didn’t suffer a bad fall in Malon’s childhood and develop memory loss.

She still had a horse mask, hidden in her drawer.

It was not that she was ashamed of it. Rather, there was just no time for it, not between work-father-husband-Ingo. Malon was just like her mother and ran the ranch and household with an iron fist. She grew from beyond being short into her own grace as a woman.

This was Malon’s life and she was happy with it. She would not trade it for the world.

//

Once upon a time, when Malon woke up one morning, her husband was not there. In fact, there was no sign of him—not around the house, not around the stables. Not around all of Lon Lon Ranch. It was simply as if he had been spirited away, and from the tales of her husband's adventures, Malon would not put it past so.

She did not panic. She did not wail, or cry, or kick and scream.

She did not wait for his return either. Malon had faith in her husband, but she had more faith in herself; she picked up one of his old swords and convinced her father to take over running the ranch for a week.  _ Only a week, _ she thought to herself,  _ no longer than a week, because you are his wife, but you are also a daughter and you have a duty. _

So she traveled around Hyrule for a week. Her skirts got dirty and Malon did not quite know how to properly take care of a sword, so it rusted after her first nasty encounter. It did not matter, because half way through, when she was praying to the Goddess, she received a sign.

_ He is safe,  _ Hylia whispered,  _ he will be alright. _

So Malon headed back home halfway early. She took over the duties of the ranch again, because she was a good daughter. She cleaned the house and every night set out an extra plate, because she was a good wife. She prayed to Hylia for his safe return, because although her husband was bitter, Malon was not. And she was a good wife, but she was also a good citizen, and so she prayed.

One morning, when the sun was still rising but she had already worked up quite a sweat, Malon thought she saw a figure in the distance. Nine of them, in fact, and when they grew closer, she began to run. "You're home," she cried joyously, "welcome back!" and Link swept her up in his arms and kissed her, and it was like their wedding day all over again. She heard murmurs from the men—the boys?—that had been following her husband.  _ Pay up,  _ one of them said.  _ How cute,  _ said another.

Malon didn't care what they thought. Her husband was  _ home. _ Link was  _ home. _

This was how Malon met all of the incarnations of the hero’s spirit. All things considered, it was not quite that bad of a meeting.

//

Her husband roped the boys into farm work, but Malon managed to snag one for herself. "Wild, right?" she said, and he nodded. The poor boy had scars all on the left side of his face—hero work, Malon assumed, but she hoped it didn't hurt as much as it looked like it did. "Well then, I've been told by Link—er, Time, that you're a good cook."

"I am," he said plainly. Malon appreciated that, the lack of sugarcoating and the plain truth.  _ Honest work was the best kind of work  _ was what she liked to say, and that meant admitting your successes as much as it did your failures. "What are we cooking?"

She glanced at the clock. "Well, with the time we have, and the number of people, I was thinking—"

"—a stew," he finished, before blushing. "Uh, sorry."

She blinked, surprised, but then laughed. "You sure do know where to put your rupees where your mouth is at, don't cha?" she said. "Come on, we have work to do," she added, tying on her apron.

So they set to work—she washed the vegetables (she thought it best to stick to something where she needn't worry over dietary restrictions for the others), and Wild went to work preparing the ingredients. At one point when she was chopping the vegetables, however, he paused.

"Miss Malon?" he said. She paused in her chopping, which prompted him to continue. "I can't find the milk all in the kitchen."

She set down her knife. "Well that's odd, isn't it," she muttered; she looked over her kitchen and pondered over where it might possibly be. And then Malon facepalmed. "Ah, I think I know where it is—my husband might have brought it into the bedroom for a late night snack."  _ Link and his milk cravings, _ she thought fondly. He would probably be worse than whenever Malon had her own pregnancy cravings.

...if they ever decided to go that far. Apparently, they would according to her husband; her mind raced thinking of which one of the boys would be hers. Would be  _ theirs. _ She shook her head clear of those thoughts, and said, "It should be in the bedroom. He might have put it in one of the drawers, if you could go search in there, please," and Wild nodded.

"Okay, Miss Malon," he said softly, and turned on his heel in search of milk.

It left her alone in the kitchen with her thoughts and the vegetables, so Malon set back to work. She picked up her knife and began to chop the carrots, and found herself thinking,  _ if this is what life is like with children, I wouldn't quite mind it. _ She ended up reaching for the potatoes before Wild returned, the milk in hand.

"Welcome back," she said, teasing, "so my husband did have the milk after all, huh?"

But oddly, he did not respond, and when Malon looked closer, she saw that his lips were pressed tight and his hand not holding the milk bottle was shaking. "Wild?" she asked—now she was concerned. "Wild, sweetheart, are you okay?"

At that, he snapped out of it. "Yes," he said, voice shaky. Then he shook his head, like he was trying to convince himself of something. "Yes, I'm alright." He placed the milk on the counter and then his hand began to shake harder. "I'm sorry," he whispered. He looked mortified. He looked like her husband on his bad days.

Malon set down her knife once more. "Wild, if you need to take a break—if you want to go out and join the boys—"

"No," he said. "No, I'm fine, I just—I just need a little breather." Suddenly, he reached out and squeezed her hand, almost a little desperate; she looked straight into his eyes and found them electric blue and panicked. "I'm—I'm sorry," he whispered again, before he turned on his heel and left.

So once more was Malon left alone with her thoughts, and it wasn't until quite some time later did Wild come back—he looked much better, even if he was still a little pale. At this point, most of the stew was done; all that was left was the seasoning and the waiting. "Sorry," he said again.

"It's alright, honey," she said, and Wild gave a small smile.

"Thank you," he said, and that was all Malon thought of the experience because the rest of the boys filed in. The rest of  _ their _ boys. And then that night, her thoughts were filled with things like children and ranches, and she thought, _ if this is the legacy that we get, then I think I would love to be a mother. _

//

Once upon a time, long after her and her husband's boys had visited and then left, and came back, one day they did not come back at all. Her husband came home empty-handed and in grief, and she tried her best to console him. It did not work; he was inconsolable.

The only time when he was not was when Malon gave birth to their first child—and then, because she'd always dreamt of a big family, another. And perhaps one more. (Her guess, a very long time ago, was right—her husband had weirder cravings than she did.) The details tended to get lost in history, and Malon was happy with her three children and her husband. Even when the new prince of Hyrule broke his treaty with the Gorons, even when there were whispers of  _ violence  _ and  _ bloodshed  _ and other awful things on the horizon.

One day, the war knocked on their doorstep. Her husband was older even still, now, but he still kissed her forehead and his hair was still sun blond, although sometimes it looked silver in the light too. "I will come back," he said, donning that silly armor of his. The chestplate looked like a bird, and the metal was smooth under her fingers when she strapped it on him.

"Not with that armor," she teased, and he laughed and swept her up and kissed her. It felt like their wedding day all over again.

And then he died.

The army brought him back with a couple of soldiers. It was all they could afford to spare; when Malon opened the door with a smile, she saw a casket and a young man whose soldier uniform was too big to fit him properly. "I'm sorry, ma'am," he whispered softly.

She felt her world crumble beneath her. But Malon was a good wife, and she was a good citizen and she was a good mother. She stepped aside and let him in, and her heart panged when she saw him take off his helmet—he was young. He did not have sun blond hair, but it was brown, and even though Malon was old she still remembered all the same a boy with brown hair and curious markings on his face. And he was her legacy. She saw a boy who was in the army, and for a second, she thought,  _ my children could be like him. _

"It's alright," she said instead. "Come inside, I have tea," because the very least she could do was offer him this. But the soldier shook his head.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I can’t, my duty calls." She did not see him again.

//

Once upon a time, a war happened on her doorstep and Malon and her children survived through it. Her children were older, now, and all of them were getting married and having kids. Hyrule had won the war, and it showed—it showed in the preachings of the church and the royalty. It showed when Hyrule began to expand just that  _ little  _ bit further. The roads, stretched, now, beyond the horizon. Castletown turned from a small if booming town to the beginnings of a sprawling metropolis.

But that did not matter as much as this did: it mattered when the horses were growing old. Malon had raised and lived and breathed horses all her life, and when they began to grow old, so did she. (She was not quite sure if it was because of her grief or if they were just that much in tune. Perhaps it would have been a little bit of both.)

The world moved on without Malon. It moved on without  _ Link. _

The world moved on without the Hero of Time. Nobody told stories of the masks he used, or that he united a kingdom with seven sages. No one talked about how the hero was just that—a  _ hero.  _ Her husband did not become a story. He did not become a fairy tale hero, a legend passed down through the ages. There would be no one who they remembered but Princess Zelda.

For all the princess talked of her husband's deeds—well. The details tended to get lost in history.

Malon was old. Her hair was grey, now, long gone from being fiery red. She had little grandchildren who ran in between and around her legs, now. Most importantly, she remembered eight other men, all incarnations of an endless cycle. She remembered her husband, and the bad nights he had.

_ It will never end,  _ he had said,  _ I will never get rest and I will be reborn again and again. _

She thought about that a lot. She thought about how there would be no legend of a hero, no words or guidance for when his soul was reborn again. And she thought of a boy with brown hair, and this knowledge  _ scalded  _ her.

She grew older; there were wrinkles on her face from laughing and smiling and crying. There were grandchildren and they had her red hair (it would take centuries to water down). Once upon a time, Malon is older than she ever hoped she would be, and there is a horse mask that she has not touched for years that sits in her drawer.

When her lungs ached, when her chest began to seize up, Malon smiled and asked that she be buried with the mask on. And then one day, she did not smile at all, because she had died. Her family mourned, and her eldest—her daughter—put the mask on her. And a very, very long time ago, there was once a Happy Mask Salesman who said that no harm would ever befall her if she put it on. The goddess had willed it so.

Her father had been very happy about that. He should have paid much more attention.

//

Once upon a time, there was a horse goddess. She dealt with life, and death, and when she had first died, she was not as dead as her family had thought. But she was not herself—not anymore. The Goddess had taken it away from her.

She burned, now, with this: the knowledge of her(?) husband's legacy (and the lack thereof). She burned with divinity not wanted but given anyways, and her blood ran hot without mortality to temper it down. The horse goddess traded her fiery hair for the immortal fire running in her blood. She traded her mortality for its absence. Her name was Malanya, and she was a horse goddess. She chose who lived or who died—only amongst horses, of course, because obviously it was only the Goddess Reborn who was allowed any say in her choices of heroes and villains.

Immortality made time pass differently. Hours turned into seconds the same way centuries turned into years. Time passed. A new hero was born at the turn of the century, and the horse goddess remembered cupping his cheek when he was older (not wiser, but probably smarter). He was her legacy, this boy, and that thought made her somber.

She was a young goddess. She was not a young soul.

Time passed on. The horse goddess' world began to change—people began realizing of her existence, of how when she roamed the plains, a horse's song left her mouth and called the horses to her. And her name was Malanya, not because it was the name Hylia had given her. (No—Hylia had called her Epona.) Her name was Malanya because that's what the people liked to call her when they prayed in worship.

They prayed to her for their horses, and so Malanya granted them that. They came in droves, sometimes; there were desperate men and broken women and those in between. And Malanya was not a kind goddess, but she understood balance intimately—after all, who else but a goddess of life and death, a wife who sacrificed everything for a husband who had nothing to lose, could govern as such?

The worship grew, and so did a pool of sugar magic that she slept in. It tasted of sweetness and good things, and the horse goddess stopped roaming the planes and singing a horse's song. She traded the wilderness for a home. She was a goddess of balancing acts, after all.

And the cycle started anew. The land they called Hyrule had grown beyond the borders, beyond what seemed imaginable, and there was a new princess born. And Malanya could taste it, and instantly, the horse goddess knew that there was another hero.

In seventeen years’ time, the world fell in flames and fury and in technology promised that ended up in lies. Malanya grew weak; by now she was an old goddess, and even though she had not been around since the age of the ancient sky, she had stayed since the era of time. But without her worship, without the sugar magic which fed her, she shriveled and grew weak. There was no worship to power her. No one came, no one prayed, no one offered. Her fountain curled into a bud, and she slept.

//

Across Hyrule, there was a boy who had scars like fireworks splashing across his skin. One hundred years ago, there was a desperate princess who had put him to sleep. His name was Link, and he did not know anything else beyond that he had tried to follow his destiny and failed it.

A princess gave him a chance.  _ Will you let me save you? _

_ No,  _ the boy first said. But the princess shook her head and did not hide her trembling hands; no one was alive who would judge her for it. She had survived in spite for seventeen years and this boy did not even have that. How could he, when he had always been so good and he was going to die?

_ For me? _ she said, and the boy did not respond because he had died.

Here, there is no timeline divergence, because the princess made the choice for him. She called upon the shadow guard which had guarded her for millennia, and would forever continue to do so, and told them  _ you must bring him to the shrine otherwise he will die and it will be  _ my fault.

Whatever their answer, a boy woke up one hundred years later.

//

A boy woke up one hundred years later, and after he had done a great deal of his journey, he happened upon a curled up bud. More important than that, he had  _ come. _ And he prayed, and he offered the rupees held in his hand. They were warm with the magic of nature and humanity alike, stories of what they had been traded for impressed in them. When he dropped them in a horse goddess' pool of sugar magic, Malanya grew, and rose once more.

When she saw him, she thought she remembered cooking with him once on a ranch she used to own. He did not, but that was okay, for this was more important: he came back. He prayed. He offered, more than just worship, but stories and an ear to listen. When the horse goddess and him argued, it reminded Malanya of a song she used to sing. Or, perhaps, it reminded Malon of a song her husband used to play, wooden and breathy on his ocarina.

The boy was a hero. The horse goddess knew this, for it was written on the sword on his back. But she grew close to him anyway, even when her heart ached for a boy she knew so long ago just like this—who had hair that was sun blond and a funny craving for milk. 

One time, when the boy came and prayed and offered, he said, "I'm going to go fight Ganon."

"Will you, now?" Malanya asked. She was lounging in her pool of sugar-magic. 

"Yes," he said. But his hands were trembling, and the horse goddess—Malanya— _ Malon _ —took them into her own hands. And they were not whole, they were made of magic and wood and dwarfed the hero's. But his trembling stilled, and he looked at her with big cow eyes. 

"You will come back, then," she said.

"How?" the boy asked. "How do you know I will not fail again?"

"Because I am very tired of men failing," the horse goddess said. "I am a good wife, and a good citizen, and a good mother. And I have lived for a very long time and seen many men fail. But you will not," she said. Malon thought of a boy standing in her kitchen and making stew with him.

The boy stood there, and he stopped trembling in time. Malanya smiled. "I will pray for your victory," she said, because she was a good citizen. The boy did not respond and blinked, surprised, and Malon laughed. "Just because I am a goddess does not mean I do not pray, boy."

The boy blinked once more, and then shook his head. "I guess that makes sense," he said, and then paused. Then, "Thank you, Malanya," he said. "But—” his tongue darted out and he licked his lips, nervous, “but I think you’re more than all those things, you're just good, too."

Then he was gone, and he left Malanya to reflect upon his words. She thought of her life—that she was a good daughter, and she was a good wife, and she was a good citizen. She had never called herself just  _ good  _ before, where her obligation was only to herself, until someone else did.

And Malanya smiled. "See?" she called to empty air. "You cannot fail, hero—you've already saved someone, don't you see?" And if the wind whistled a horse song and the boy heard it, well. No one could quite see his smile as he marched to his destiny.

When the malice around the castle fell, Malanya had been praying to the goddess before she felt it—when the balance of nature had shifted, when magic had restored itself once more. The horse goddess smiled when she saw a familiar figure head back to her fairy fountain; travelers were visiting once more, and the pool of sugar-magic grew. "I told you, didn't I?" the horse goddess said.

"You did," he agreed. There was a princess—or rather, a girl who was waiting behind him. She looked apprehensive, and Malanya did not beckon her forth. For all her love, for all she was Malon, she was a goddess, too. Immortals did not concern themselves with the doings of mortals—even if it was those who carried the blood of the goddess.

"Then welcome to the horse spring, Hero of the Wild," Malanya said. That was his title, and he wore it with pride. And he came back, and he prayed, and he offered. 

//

One day, he did not return. Not until some time later. But this time, there were eight men behind him. This time, when he traveled to the horse spring, his stride was urgent—when he reached the foot of her spring, he crumbled to his knees and began to sob. 

"I'm sorry—" he gasped, "I'm sorry, Miss Malon." The horse goddess stilled at that, but she was a good mother, and she was good. Once more, she took his trembling hands in hers, made of wood and magic and unwhole, and he stilled.

"It was the milk, wasn't it?" she said. "All those years ago."

He stilled, breath catching. "Yes," he said. "Yes, it was."

And Malanya laughed—cackled, more like it, because she was an old goddess but an even older soul. "Of course my husband would somehow do this, him and his silly cravings," she said. "But it is okay. It is not your fault."

"How?" he said. "How do you know?"

And she smiled, when she saw the rest of his companions begin to come over the horizon and across the bridge. "Because I said so,” she said. It was that simple, and it had taken her more than several lifetimes to admit it. “And that’s all that matters. You know I am tired of men failing," she said. "And once, a man told my father that I was special. He was a fool, my father," she said lovingly, "that he had to hear the words from another man to believe it, rather than simply just know that his daughter was special."

"Oh," Wild said, and the horse goddess rose. Malanya rose out of her sugar-magic and stepped out of it for the first time in a millennium. When her feet touched the plains, Malon began to sing a horse's song. Her hands were made of wood and magic and were unwhole; she was a goddess who traded (unwillingly) her mortality for divinity.

When Malon saw her husband, she grinned. She was not whole, admittedly—she was not the same Malon he first got down on one knee for a millennium ago, an ugly ring in his hands. But she loved him,  _ still  _ loved him even so much time later.

The heroes came to a stop around them. "Who is this?" one of them said—the Hero of Twilight, Malon recalled, who had brown hair that had taken centuries to be so.

She smiled. Perhaps her father was right in some ways: for the story was not about a Happy Mask Salesman. It was not about a hero who was destined to reincarnate and reincarnated for destiny. It was not about princesses.

"I am the horse goddess," she said. "I am Malanya. I am Malon, and I have waited a millenium to tell a story."

Her husband froze and she laughed. It sounded like a horse's song. "I have stayed to tell my husband's story," she said, "and I will. But I think there is another story I should tell first," she said, and one of the heroes looked at her with wide eyes.

"I love stories," he said, and his Joy Pendant jingled around his neck. “Will you tell it, Miss Malon?” She looked at him and laughed.

"Yes, I will, and if you like stories then I think you will like this one," she said. "Do you know the story of the Hero of Time?"

"I do, I do," he said, and Malon smiled. Perhaps she did get some rest, somehow.

"Then you will know that when they talk about the Hero of Time, sometimes they will talk about his masks." She paused, but did not look at her husband—this was her story to tell, and no one else's. She breathed in. She was mortal and immortal, a balance in between, and Malon said, "What they did not talk about was the one his wife possessed."

**Author's Note:**

> find me on https://mochibun23.tumblr.com/ ! i'm also on discord if you ever want to chat. thank you for reading!


End file.
